Secret Santa
by Psyche Eros
Summary: Christmas is the best time for little surprises, and a certain Hitachiin has a special one planned for his twin and best friend.


She stared at my Christmas present.

"What—"

I held up my hand to stop her and grinned. She didn't have time to respond; I was already walking away.

* * *

I stayed behind that day, declining the boys' offers to give me a ride home. I needed to think.

Carefully, I took the jar of instant coffee out of my bag. It had been attached with a note that said "Coffee goes well with cookies, don't you think?" and there was an address.

I sighed. Kaoru never made any sense.

* * *

"Hey Kaoru, what's this all about?"

I glanced over at my brother. "It's part one of my gift to you. Don't you like it?"

"Part one? It doesn't make any sense. And this necklace is pretty weird," he said, dangling the blue, oddly-shaped pendant.

I just smiled.

* * *

The next day, I decided to visit the address on the note. It turned out to be a bakery and pastry shop.

"Why would he want me to go to a bakery?" I mused.

I felt silly, but I stepped inside the shop. The young lady who was attending the counter walked over to me. "Haruhi Fujioka?"

"Yes, but how did you—"

"We have something for you!"

She disappeared for a while, returned with a package wrapped with tissue paper, and went back to her counter.

I opened it. Inside was a batch of chocolate chip cookies, but they were all in half. There was another note. I read it; it said, "Go home!"

"Yeah, I was about to," I muttered. What was I even thinking, following directions from a Hitachiin?

* * *

My glaring twin met me at the door. "Where have you been?"

"Hikaru, chill. I just thought I'd go for a ride."

"You've been out a lot lately."

I shrugged. "Maybe I'll take you with me next time."

* * *

I didn't expect anything weird when I got home. Everything seemed normal enough when I entered the door, but I saw an envelope by my feet.

I opened it up at my room. There was a single red puzzle piece, and on it, a single word was written, which made no sense to me at all.

The envelope was signed by Kaoru. It figures.

* * *

"Hey Kaoru, what gives?"

"What's wrong, Hikaru?"

"I think the store where you bought your present from ripped you off. I can't finish it! It's impossible!"

I raised my eyebrow tauntingly. "Giving up so soon?"

"Why did you have to get me this thing?"

I laughed when he started to pout. "Listen, I'll make it up to you. Wanna come to the park with me tomorrow?"

* * *

Waking up to the ringing of the phone wasn't exactly my idea of a great morning.

"Hello?"

"Hey Haruhi. Hikaru and I are heading to the park. Wanna come with?"

I yawned. "It's 7:30 in the morning."

"Just come, okay? We'll have a picnic by the place where they decorated the trees with all that Christmas-y stuff."

"Alright…"

"Wait! Don't forget to bring my presents, okay?"

He hung up. I growled in frustration. If this was some stupid game again, I would kill the twins.

* * *

"What do you mean you're not coming?"

"Exactly that, Hikaru. I would love to go, but something really important came up. I'm sorry!"

"But I froze my butt off waiting for you—"

_Click._

I grinned. I know Hikaru must be so frustrated by now, but I was enjoying this a lot.

* * *

"Haruhi? What are you doing here?"

"What do you mean? You and your brother told me to come."

"Kaoru called you? Well in any case, he said he's not coming."

"So it's just me and you then?"

"I guess so."

I pointed to the basket beside him. "What's that, Hikaru?"

* * *

I laid out the picnic blanket Kaoru had packed. I was going to get my brother for this.

Haruhi looked puzzled at the rest of the contents when I took them out of the basket.

"Kaoru told me to bring a thermos full of hot water and some cups. I have no idea why, but…" I tried to steer away from my feeble attempts at explanation and pointed to her bag. "What did you bring?"

* * *

I took out my jar of instant coffee with a light chuckle. "Your brother gave me this for Christmas. I had been wondering why."

Hikaru looked at his bag. "Oh, almost forgot. I have these too… But they look kinda… well…"

He brought out a package and opened it, showing the contents to me. There were chocolate chip cookies in there; halves of them. I grinned as I showed him the cookies I had and he began to laugh.

* * *

After we had our fill of cookies and coffee, we sat comfortably, just chatting. Then I remembered that I had something else with me. I showed it to Haruhi.

"Kaoru told me to bring this along so we wouldn't get bored. It's impossible to solve though."

I tipped out the jigsaw puzzle before her.

* * *

Hikaru and I tried our best to solve the puzzle, which was very hard to do. The pieces were all plain white; there was only one piece that was different, the one that had the black-inked word "complete" on it. I thought it was all completely pointless, but we had fun all the same.

I had the idea that the piece with the word 'complete' on it might be the center of the puzzle so we tried that.

* * *

"Hey what do you know, we're almost finished with it!" I exclaimed.

Haruhi looked at the two spaces on either side of the piece with the word 'complete.'

"There are two pieces missing though…"

Her eyes widened and she started to fish for something in her pocket. "I think I know where one of them is."

"Me too!" I suddenly said, unfastening the chain on my neck.

* * *

I gazed at the finished jigsaw puzzle. Hikaru and I had placed our pieces in at the same time.

His blue piece and my red piece fit perfectly on either side of the word 'complete,' and we read the sentence it formed. I felt my face grow warmer.

* * *

I re-read the puzzle and caught sight of Haruhi, who was looking at it with glazed eyes.

I inched closer to her, jolted to my senses at last, wondering why it had to be a silly old jigsaw puzzle that would make me see sense.

"Haruhi," I whispered.

* * *

I blushed even deeper when he moved closer to me and said my name, so I forced my eyes to look instead at the festively decorated tree branches. Big mistake; what I saw hanging from the branch directly above us only made my face go fully red.

He seemed to be a little upset when I remained quiet and asked, "What are you looking at up there?"

He glanced upward.

* * *

Looking up, I felt color rising in my face. "Haruhi, what—" then I saw. "…Mistletoe."

She turned to look at me now, and I realized her face had never been so close to mine before. Her eyes were so beautiful… How could I not notice that?

"Kaoru set this all up, huh?" she breathed.

I could only nod.

"Remind me to thank your brother," she whispered.

* * *

I looked at him, surprised at all the feelings that were welling up in me. They were pleasant emotions... He took my hand, and it was perfect around mine…

"Haruhi?"

He leaned in even closer and whispered the words on the puzzle.

"_You complete me."_

_

* * *

_

I peeked out from behind the bush I had been hiding in just in time to see Haruhi and my twin in a sweet lip-lock under the mistletoe.

"Well it's about time, you two!" I laughed to myself. "Hohoho, merry Christmas..."

* * *

**A/N: Well, this is just a drabble-ish story... I took a break from writing the heavy drama stuff, and as you can see, I'm not too good with romantic stories. Anyway, I hope you weren't messed up when I switched around their POVs, and I hope you didn't find it too corny. **

**Reviews, please? I'll consider it as your Christmas present for me! Happy Holidays to everyone, by the way...**

**=^0^=**

**x0x0,**

**.psyche.**


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